After a discussion with Big Blue public relations chief Pat Hanlon, Coughlin decided to “take the gloves off” — one-on-one — with each member of the media.

“I was not helping them do their job to the best of their abilities,” Coughlin said. “That was wrong. I was wrong.”

Tom Coughlin

He decided to be more forthcoming.

And less prickly.

“I’m gonna change,” Coughlin said of his thought process. “I’m gonna try to be a better communicator. I’m gonna try to treat people with respect. I’m gonna try to bite my tongue and be more patient and that type of thing. I think it started there, and then it carried over obviously to our team.”

“Quite frankly, somehow I would think I expressed myself very plainly … but there would be four or five different interpretations, which told me that I wasn’t doing a great job of communicating,” he said. “So I used this group and they were great — Michael Strahan was one of them. And it gave me a chance to talk to the players also about, you know, what my values were and what my thinking was, and let them talk.”

Tom Coughlin

Strahan wrote the forward (“A Winning Relationship”) to Coughlin’s new book, “Earn the Right to Win.” The book isn’t so much a retelling of the 66-year-old’s success with the Giants — it’s more a game plan for success in business and life.

And sometimes that starts with change.

More from Coughlin:

On having to release players like Ahmad Bradshaw: “We’re very, very respectful of the players that have helped this franchise to historical wins and historical games and Super Bowl championships. We are very, very, very respectful and grateful and love these guys. But it is what it is, man.”